Switch

Mama took a switch
to my backside
when I misbehaved,
with a skinny length of
honeysuckle branch
stripped bare of its leaves,
but there wasn't nothin'
sweet about it
just the slap and sting
of that thin piece of wood
on my bare skin
as if bees were looking for
that sweet honeysuckle syrup on me
and mad they couldn't find it